Many older houses all over the country have above ground electric and phone wiring that includes utility poles. The price isn't going to be lowered for that.

It depends on where it is in the yard and whether it's a typical thing in the neighbourhood.

Good questions. No, it's not typical for it to be in a yard (not even the poles in a yard), and it's about to go across my driveway. That, I am about to fight the city on.

It was just a pole on the very back corner of the property and that was ok, but the wire they're installing much later on (we've been there over a year and the pole isn't even close to new) is squarely in my already small yard. It's more than bothersome, I find it irksome. If they want to put it across an alley that's never accessed, go for it. My yard and driveway seems like it'd bother not just me, but affect any possibility of selling the house on the down the line.

Many times utility companies have 'x' feet of easement (like 2' or 3') on all property in a city.

Your deed will tell you if the utility has an easement or not.

Guys, I'm aware of easement (I have a pole in my yard to start with!), but that wasn't my question. If you want to address the originally posted questions, feel free? If not, it's ok, I don't expect to hear legal arguments on the internet ;)

We try to help and he argues with us. No thanks.

Then ask questions instead of assuming Stan. Here, I'll say it again: I was looking for outside, objective views. Won't get them here I see! I wondered what a prospective home buyer might think. That was it.

You didn't answer my questions in the first place Christopher, so I am not sure how that helped? It helps me understand you, but that's about it.

OK - I'll bite. A high tension power line will devalue a home, phone poles are a fact of life. I think you're being real anal about this.

If the house was otherwise acceptable, I wouldn't give it a thought unless it was in the middle of the yard.

I currently have TWO utility poles in my yard. The positive result of one of them is that it also has the only streetlight for a couple hundred yards, so I have a well-lit parking area for free.

Thanks for your answer lazy_gardens. I'm glad to see however it happens, it's gonna be ok. I'm glad it's on the edge of the property :)

rob, is the wire for your service, or someone else?

I much prefer buried lines, so moving back to an area with poles and wires, and having a line be even more prominent than the norm, would bug me. I would probably ding the likability of the house a bit. But then, I'd also ding the entire neighborhood for not burying them. Other people don't see the visual noise, because they have always lived where there are poles and lines perhaps.

We have a phone pole in the front yard. Just past our front walkway. It is right next to the sidewalk. It was there when we bought the house and we didn't even give it a second thought. In our town, utility poles near the street and in yards are the norm (my house is 125+ years old). Only newer developments near beaches or scenic views have to have their utilities buried. So it is a non-issue for me, and I suspect the majority of people looking to buy.

No, I would not think that having a telephone pole in my yard would devalue the property. All of our homes in the attached picture have market values of 350k - 500k....and we all have electric and phone service....an added plus!

In our last neighborhood about 12 years ago, all the neighbors pooled our funds together to have power lines buried for our block. it was a $50,000 project

What is the new line for? Does it follow an existing utility ROW? Will the new line require a new pole to be installed on your property?

I have 3 poles on my property that should be on the county ROW but are well onto my property. The electric utility claims a 40' ROW denying me use of almost 1 acre. The interesting thing is that if someone needs power across the road from me they have to have MY permission for their line to cross over my property, the electric co cannot force me to grant permission.

Good luck dealing with NES, or the City of Nashville, you'll need it!

We have one our rental home and it didn't detour us. We love the neighborhood and the houses are all 100 years old.

rob, I think it would depend on the neighborhood, the stage of my purchase and the value of the home. We just confronted that. For the purchase of an old, 40s home tore down and rebuilt? Fine. The current value of our home, and the others rebuilt on our street? No way anybody would put up with that. So we spent the few bucks to bury the wires, get rid of what was unsightly and also unstable- large trucks could down the wires, as could tree limbs in a storm- and everybody's happy

I appreciate all the responses since I last was over here. I'm glad to see no one would be deterred if the line was there. It's the only pole on the street (going down it I counted, of seven or so) that will have a wire. All of the poles in our area are looking sad, I noticed. I think Nashville is going to have to pony up and fix a lot of them. One pole somewhere else in our neighborhood, but not my street, I saw had three old wires, and instead of replacing it, they had two new wire loops like the one they put in my yard. I thought to myself, if it needs five wires maybe it's time to replace the pole! Dang ;) It'll be ok. They are reviewing my request and haven't said no. But if they do, I get it. The pole is probably for loads of people, and it's better to be safe than anything else. That I am anal about. We need poles to stay upright.

I'm getting a little confused by your description. When you are talking about 'wires' do you mean the anchor cables that go from the top of the pole into the ground?

Like in this diagram?

Do you have one of those anchor cables terminating in the middle of your yard?!? THAT I would have a problem with. At least in my area, they cover those with a bright yellow cover so that people don't walk into them or something. They're a real eyesore.

A picture of your situation would really clear things up and get honest opinions instead of just relying on people's own biased imagination of what it looks like.

Not the middle of my yard, the edge, but really it's going to block my driveway. That, I'm trying to work with them about. Actually, I moved in just over a year ago, and there is nothing paved, but it was about to happen. Still haven't finished painting it! The ring the wire goes to in the ground is located on the W. No way a car could pass under it? I think NES agrees. We'll see how it pans out.

Oh, you are referring to the guy wire. There are different styles that can be built, for going over sidewalks and roads. Unfortunately, if that is the direction the guy needs to be on, an overhead guy will require an additional pole (towards the "W"), plus a diagonal guy wire. And that looks like it would end up being in front of your house. But you would be able to use the driveway.

That's the back of the house ;)

Sorry, I remember you saying that now. I'm used to driveways in the front!

To answer your question, yes, it would bother me big time. But then I'm from a country where all wires are underground. (And pls don't tell me that this is such a big country...). You have gas and water/sewer lines buried here, too.

It's mind boggling how frequently and how long I am out of power in the nation's capital. I refuse to buy a generator to the tune of 10-12K, even though by now most of my neighbors have one. (Adds a nice surround sound).

All of the lines and poles have and will continue to deter us because we like everything to be buried. Yes we have built and buried a line on a large acreage in a very rocky area so I know the cost. Plus it's nice not worrying about the extra lines or poles that can get broken in storms.

Buried wires can cause trouble as they age. I live near a 1960's subdivision with buried electric service. Over a period of months, several houses suffered fires of electrical origin. They're all on the same underground feeder, and persistent residents eventually got the utility to replace that feeder. It was a bigger deal than replacing overhead wires.

We bought our lake house with an electric pole 4 feet off the corner of our house. It didn't stop the sale. The pole fed our house and the neighbors on either side. I never liked that pole.

When we were adding a new garage and paved drive, we decided the pole must go! We had to pay $5,000 to have a new pole put in place. We paid it! So happy to have pole behind the shed now.

Kathy G in MI